Cirrus@Austlit

' I once worked behind the bar at a Liberal Party fundraiser, an event that I observed with the curious detachment of a David Attenborough documentary. It was an intensely formal affair with great attention to the post-nominal initials of its many distinguished guests and a floor plan that paid great attention to everyone's place in an unarticulated hierarchy. The main feature, apart from a fifties-style crooner and a host who seemed to derive great pleasure out the phrase 'Juliar', was a keynote address from a prominent historian whose work focused on the First Fleet...' (Publication abstract)

' I was nineteen years old when my memory failed me. It was the days between Christmas and New Year's Eve; days I spent laying in bed with a paper fan watching Daria in its entirety on my laptop. That Christmas was the first I had spent living out of home. I had arrived at my mother's house in the afternoon on Christmas Eve and left in the morning on Boxing Day, leaving behind drying roast meat in packets of alfoil for a Brisbane share house that peeled paint and groaned in the wind. Lounging around, slow and steaming, while watching a cartoon seemed an entirely appropriate way to celebrate this new found independence.'

 (Publication abstract)

'One day a girl goes with her mother and little sister to their dentist for a routine check-up. After the dentist has finished examining the girl's teeth with his little scratching-stick and his tiny mirror, he calls the girl's mother back into the room...' (Publication abstract)

 

'The room itself reminds me of something out of a catalogue advertisement. Sterile and impersonal - there's nothing on the walls except a few posters about flu shots and hand washing. Large, cushy arm chairs neatly circle the space like insulation for its big, hollow centre. It's dry and bleached out and oddly ritualistic. There's no real noise, barring the blip of monitors and the place stinks of bleach. I'm bundled up in my senior jacket from high school and a fitted skirt. My hair is tight on my head, my make-up lavish. I've recently started a new job and, except for the jacket, which I'll shed before I heading there, I'm keen to impress.' (Publication abstract)